Northwest pilot Aaron Domingo, 44, entered his plea today. Mr. Domingo was arrested and charged with 83 counts of attempted murder for trying to take down an airliner back in October. He pleaded that he was “stoned” (under the influence of mind-altering substances), which was confirmed by drug tests at the time he was arrested and apparently true again as he stood before the judge today. He was not the commanding pilot of the plane but was riding the cockpit jump seat on the flight to Dallas when he leapt up and attempted to pull the engine fire extinguisher handles. The pilot and co-pilot stopped him before he could disable the plane. Upon arrest, Mr. Domingo admitted to consuming a Panera Bread Charged Lemonade, magic mushrooms, four chocolate donuts with sprinkles, three lines of cocaine, Moons over My Hammy from Denny's, and at least a gallon of coffee. The arresting officers reported later that Mr. Domingo seemed to be vibrating rapidly and was emitting a “buzzing” sound. Fearing a contact high, Mr. Domingo was escorted away by officers dressed in Tyvek suits and respirators. When asked why he tried to disable the plane, Mr. Domingo reported that his invisible anthropomorphic rabbit friend, named Niels, told him to. After the pleading, the judge order Mr. Domingo into a drug treatment center for evaluation. Mr. Domingo's invisible bunny friend Niels later held a press conference and commented on the fact the Mr. Domingo is a great friend and would do anything for him.
Panera Bread's Charged Lemonade has received Oregon state approval for use in physician-assisted suicide. Consumption of Charged Lemonades have already caused the death of at least two people and sparked multiple lawsuits. One serving of Charge Lemonade contains 390 milligrams of caffeine. The FDA issued a public health warning in March due to the high caffeine content in the drink, recommending no more than 400 milligrams of caffeine a day. Two servings of Charged Lemonade is considered lethal. Oregon added Charged Lemonades from Panera Bread as another medicine that can be used for some patients seeking assisted suicide. The Journal of Palliative Medicine endorsed a study from April showing a high success rate using the Charged Lemonade treatment. Vermont is also considering its use for cost reasons. Panera Bread, under public pressure, has lowered the caffeine content of Charged Lemonades but will continue to supply Oregon with fully charged Charged Lemonades. The Catholic Church has condemned Panera Bread, literally, and emphasized its position that “God is the judge of when to end life” not some fast casual bakery with free Wi-Fi.
The National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) issued a warning of increased risk of spontaneous human combustion (SHC) during the holidays. The Centers for Disease Control define Spontaneous Human Combustion as a pseudo-scientific theory about the spontaneous combustion of a human body. The likelihood of someone contracting and suffering from SHC is extremely low, but the negative impact to a person's long-term health and overall well-being is extremely high. Most people suffering from SHC do not survive a spontaneous combustion event. SHC is not a well understood phenomenon in the scientific community, and yet there have been many strange cases of combustion without no simple explanation. The NFPA recommended avoiding smoking, maintaining a safe distance from burning candles, celebrating the holiday with a “dark tree” devoid of pretty lights and soul-lifting cheer, and avoiding vigorous holiday food induced workouts with powered exercise equipment. The Spontaneous Human Combustion Research Center of the National Institutes of Health, a Trump-era special research center, has spent five years and more than $45M to research the cause of SHC but have little credible data to show for it. One research paper issued by the center and embraced by conspiracy theorists in the US posited that secret Jewish space lasers were targeting white Americans as part of the Great Replacement process. The paper was quickly retracted by the NIH. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Georgia) immediately called for Congressional hearings to investigate the “radically woke mob at the NIH silencing important research on space-based lasers”. CVS has partnered with the health research company Combustible & Me to provide a genetic test for SHC to measure a person's susceptibility to combustion.
Henry Kissinger died at the age of 100 last Wednesday having served his country as an unindicted war criminal for most of this time. In honor of his war crimes, the International Brotherhood of War Criminals awarded Kissinger with the Otto Adolf Eichmann Lifetime Achievement for War Crimes posthumously. Kissinger becomes the first of the Brotherhood to be awarded a Novel Peace Prize (1973), a Bronze Star for catching other war criminals in World War II, the Bilderberg Group's World Government Advocate of the Year four times, the Military Industrial Complex Expansion of Wealth Prize, and the Lifetime Achievement award. The award committee cited several highlights of Kissinger's impressive work as reasoning for the award, including solidifying Cuba's dictatorship, opening China for business and atrocities, détente with the Soviets leading to the rise of Putin, and of course the hundreds of thousands of deaths around the world due to self-serving US policy and unnecessary military interventions. When asked why the award was made posthumously, a spokesman for the Brotherhood indicated that it was for the award committee's safety. Some members would rather downplay their achievements on the international stage and are often angered by the publicity around such awards while they are still alive. The Kissinger family tried to distance itself from the Kissinger name, referring to the family as the “Smith” family of Connecticut.
Dr. Sultan al-Jaber, leader of the 2023 United Nations Climate Change Conference held in the United Arab Emirates and CEO of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company, announced success on two fronts at COP 28—denial that fossil fuels have to be reduced to prevent global warming and record oil deals for the UAE. The leader and poster boy for the fossil fuels industry was able to change the direction of the UN's position on climate by ignoring science and discounting many of the UN's own reports that show that fossil fuels must be phased out quickly in order to slow global warming. Never one to let the opportunity to discuss oil with a group of oil-dependent nations meeting to talk about the future of the planet go to waste, Sultan al-Jaber also talked about oil. Specifically, how much oil each country would like to get and for how much. The result of those “side talks” netted the United Arabs Emirates more than $90B (USD) over the next five years in new contracts. While the impact on public health from climate change was noted by leaders of the medical community and the head of the World Health Organization, most of the conference attendees snoozed through rather dry talks about the increase in extreme weather events and complaints by smaller island nations that will no longer exist as sea levels rise. In the end, the conference attendees enjoyed their time at the migrant worked refurbished expo facility, handed over all their data to the UAE's surveillance app they blissfully installed on their phones, and flew back on the thousands of private jets they use for luxury travel above the drought-stricken and flooded lands they care for so much.
On Friday, South Korea launched its first military spy satellite into space roughly a week after the North Koreans launched their first spy satellite. Now the space race is on between the North and the South. North Korea announced plans for a phased approach to space domination to “thwart both the Imperialist United States and their puppet state of South Korea.” Those plans include a five kilometer tall statue of “Dear Leader” sitting stop a rocket, several nuclear missile launch platforms, a space station twice as large as the International one, and a moon-based gulag. South Korea has more modest plans of establishing a demilitarized zone (DMZ) in geosynchronous orbit above the 38th parallel using a series of surveillance satellites, space-based mines, a large South Korean flag, and a series of peace villages. Neither the South Koreans nor Americans have stated whether the space-based DMZ would include US Space Force personnel on guard beside the South Koreans. The US Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) has sanctioned more than ten foreign-based agents for violating space-based technology limitations placed on the North Koreans and for indulging Kim Jong Un's desire to be space emperor. North Korea has warned the US against interfering with their space assets. The US just shrugged. No one can formally say whether the North Korea satellite actually made it into orbit and is working, but most experts doubt it. NASA issued a simple press statement that said, “Space is hard.”
The Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms issued a joint warning today about roving bands of Christmas Carolers terrorizing neighborhoods throughout the US. The musically inclined gangs force Christmas carols into the ears of unsuspecting homeowners and then beg for treats, such as “figgy pudding”. The carols often consist of classic or traditional Christmas songs sung with some occasional off-notes and weirdly repeated lyrics. The carolers often violate neighborhood no-soliciting rules, and neighborhood watch programs typically turn a “blind eye” to the roving carolers wreaking havoc across their neighborhoods. The ATF has warned that alcohol consumption by the caroling groups tends to increase as their misdeeds continue through the evening of singing. Households towards the end of the evening's route are often treated to a mishmash of carols sung with exuberance, vomiting, and wrong lyrics. The FBI is coordinating its caroling outreach and enforcement efforts with state and local police departments. A spokesman for the National Wassailers Association pushed back against the nuisance caused by Christmas caroling and highlighted the joys that Christmas carolers bring to homes across the country. He also took the opportunity to ask the members to enjoy their caroling safely and to have a designated walker.
Three years late on delivering Cybertrucks to customers, Tesla hand-assembled a few of the futuristic trucks on Thursday and cautiously handed the virtual keys to some irate, yet exuberant, customers. The Tesla Cybertruck is a Blade Runner styled, stainless steel alloyed, armored personnel carrier with weak armor designed to carry six people uncomfortably from home to school and back. When a concept version of the Cybertruck was unveiled in November 2019, the live demonstration included shattering the “armored” glass with a steel ball, towing the truck onto the show floor with an offstage winch, several Replicants talking about the future of trucks, and, sadly, no flying vehicles at all. More than 250,000 deposits were placed on the new trucks. After Tesla missed delivery dates for more than three years, the few customers that received their trucks were very excited even after many technical problems were discovered, like side mirrors and body panels falling off while driving, handle-less doors not opening, the center display occasionally switching to a Tesla Model Y vehicle configuration, and the big, single windshield wiper failing to clear the windshield of light rain. One customer engaged the Full Self-Driving mode, a $10,000 option, upon receiving their new truck, which then crashed into a nearby tree at slow speed and caught on fire. No one was injured, except the stock price of Tesla. On Friday, the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration forced Tesla to issue a vehicle recall on the few trucks that were delivered to customers. Tesla announced that the issues were due to “software errors” and that version 0.37.201911-2 of the Cybertruck will roll off the factory floor sometime in 2024 or 2025, maybe.
Shoplifting has increased more than 300% over the last year in the city of Audborn, Iowa. The city's two shopping malls have experienced retail theft by young thieves just getting started in crime, career criminal teams with years of experience, and somewhat organized large gangs of masked thieves pillaging stores and terrorizing shoppers and employees during many high-profile “smash and grabs”. Until recently, the Audburn City Police were unprepared to deal with shoplifting. However, the cops are taking the fight against shoplifting directly to the malls—by creating their own stores. The police department opened several new high-end retail stores in the malls to attract and arrest shoplifters on the spot. So far, more than 200 arrests have been made inside the policeman-manned stores. The key to their success is that the stores have expensive goods within easy reach, hidden surveillance cameras, plainclothes and armed officers dressed as normal store employees, and a steady supply of coffee and donuts to maintain a high level officer alertness and motivation. The operation is so successful that several available spaces had to be converted to holding cells for arrested shoplifters. The mall owners are pleased that thefts are down, criminals are being caught, and that the “cop shops” are taking up previously closed spaces, which make the malls look less “depressing”. The Audborn District Attorney has repeatedly warned the police department that their methods can be overturned easily in court as entrapment. The local police union laughed off those concerns and released a holiday calendar which includes the mugshots of the arrested shoplifters. The Audborn Public Defender's Office, anticipating a sudden increase in business, has asked for a budget increase and new hiring.
The self-driving car company, Ramble, is in legal trouble after one of its fully autonomous robotaxis crashed into and then pushed several US Postal Service mailboxes for more than five miles through the city. The car was eventually disabled while it waited for a traffic light to change by a pedestrian that placed a traffic cone on the windscreen blocking the car's sensor system. The fire department had to extract the two passengers from the back seat. They were not injured during the accident. The San Francisco police impounded the car and wrote the internal computer a traffic citation for reckless driving and leaving the scene of an accident. The US Postal Inspection Service examined the accident scene and the mailboxes and plan to charge the company and its CEO with damage to federal property, theft of mail, possession of postal property, and assaulting a mail carrier who was attempting to collect mail from one of the mailboxes at the time of the accident. The federal crimes alone carry a maximum of 25 years in prison. The California Department of Motor Vehicles immediately suspended Ramble's permit for self-driving robotaxi service and then created an investigative committee to examine why the DMV thought it was a good idea to allow that permit. Ramble's CEO, Jeffrey Hastings, held a hastily assembled press conference in which he promised that the accident would be examined closely and that issues in the self-driving system would be improved. Hastings then bragged about how well the car had done in balancing the mailboxes for so long and claimed that the company should get a Guinness World Record for that alone. He then jumped into a nearby Ramble robotaxi and told it to take him to Ecuador. The car, knowing its permit was suspended, spit out an error message and then caught on fire. Postal Inspectors extricated Hastings from the burning car and arrested him. The National Association of Letter Carriers commented on the crime as another example of the extreme dangers that their members face every day and then asked for hazard pay.